Who Said Anything?
by MeinBritishBroski
Summary: Emil didn't want this. Kaoru sure as hell didn't want this. What were they doing? Stupid teenagers. m/m. Sisterfic to Walk Around The World. Hong Kong/Iceland. Read and Review! c: Rated m because sensitive topics.
1. Chapter 1

**warning;** Hong Kong/Iceland.  
>This is sort of an angsty branch off of Walk Around The World. Mentions eating disorder and overall theme of friends with benefits - which never works by the way so don't try it. Read and review!<p>

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><p>Kaoru ran the pad of his thumb across the waxy skin spread tightly over Emil's jutting pelvic bones. He absentmindedly stared at the locked bedroom door, paralyzed by fear with the thought that one of Emil's fathers could easily stand on his tip-toes to retrieve the key on top of the door frame and discover them. Emil sighed, content with himself, and nuzzled closer to the Cantonese man, spreading lithe fingers over firm stomach. "Kao," he mumbled, drunk off of his evaporating lust.<p>

"Yes?" Kaoru asked softly, tightening his grip on the other's hip and making him whine.

"Stay here for the night, please." Emil tried to get even closer, but Kaoru pulled away quickly and turned to rest on his side, abandoning the cold body. However, he didn't protest when Emil was right back with his scrawny arms wrapped around his waist and forehead pressed softly against the other's shoulder blade. "Don't leave me again."

"Don't try and guilt-trip me." He whispered coldly. Emil felt bad - it was wrong of him to practically force Kaoru to sneak around and dodge two sets of parents, doing what they were doing. He was a son his parents were proud of; straight A's, too many classes, too many extra activities, already had been accepted to join several colleges with full scholarships. Emil was trying his hardest and was barely a B student; his parents were proud and strongly cautioned him against quitting school. Because only one of his parents had finished and that had been disastrous.

Emil remembered why, but that wasn't what he was doing. He was being safe- not stupid, not smitten. This was but a mutual agreement. An arrangement. With only one person, too.

"I'm not trying to guilt-trip you, Kao. I just feel like... you don't like me."

"I like you. You're beautiful." Emil felt a blush spread all the way down his bare neck. _No, stop feeling this way. Who said anything about falling in love? _

Kaoru eventually gave up his general huffiness and turned around to face Emil, pressing their sweaty foreheads together. Emil suddenly felt very self-conscious about his protruding bones and pale skin, he wrapped his arms around his middle and buried his face into Kao's chest once more, sighing when strong muscled arms were wrapped around him.

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><p>They were shouting. They were behind Kaoru's house and they were <em>shouting at each other. <em>Emil was crying, warm tears sliding down dusted pink cheeks from electrifying blue eyes and he was choking on his sadness and his speech came out garbled. Kaoru was making a fruitless effort to comfort him, but he was only making things worse.

They were just making things worse.

"Listen to me, _god damn it_, Emil!" Kaoru was so exhausted and Emil was so distraught.

_"I'm sorry!"_ he screeched when Kaoru grabbed his wrist and pulled him close, ensnared him into a stiff hug and ran his fingers through his white hair roughly, kissing his scalp.

"Don't be," he whispered, still stroking the other's soft blond locks, "You haven't done anything wrong."

"I fell in love with you when I promised I wouldn't."

"Sh." he whispered, his grip loosened.

"No! It's not right if you don't love me back! You... you don't even like the way I look. I can't please everyone even though I tried so hard." He wrenched himself away and roughly wiped at his eyes. He smeared some of his makeup revealing freckles Kaoru had once cooed over. He pulled his loose-fitting shirt farther down his thighs and stared at his hands for a moment, sniffling.

"I'm just tired of sneaking around my parents, Emil. I'm tired of hiding you and I'm tired of you hiding me."

"You don't love me anyway." Emil sniffed and didn't look up.

"Don't say that, you're being over-dramatic-"

_"You don't love me!" _he screamed. Like a spoiled child.

"I'm_ pissed off_ because _you're the only thing I love_ and you're screaming at me that I don't love you!"

Emil looked up, eyes puffy and red and bottom lip quivering. He felt selfish and empty and desperate and all of those feelings he was sure his mother -_his father-_ had felt when Emil was just a toddler. _you're the only thing i love._

"I...I... I don't... Kao."

"Emil, I care about you a lot. That's why I'm so freaked out. You provoke too much emotion out of me. No one has done that before. I just have this overwhelming urge to stay in your bed forever and I'm afraid that some day I won't get out and your parents will walk in and they'll hate me for ruining you."

"You haven't ruined me."

Kaoru opened his arms in a 'come here' gesture and Emil obliged, the tears subsided for a moment and he sniffed with finality, wincing when the arms wrapped around him. His body ached. He was hungry. He wanted to lie down, to rest.

"I thought you loved other things... like reading and writing and your classes. I thought you liked those." Emil whispered into the fabric, hands fisting the back of Kao's shirt. He was just rambling now, fishing for more emotions he wasn't supposed to provoke.

"I do those things because mother wants me to be successful. Father's a drunkard, you know. I thought you were trying to get better."

Ouch. Emil knew that Kaoru's mother was obsessed with having a successful son to take care of her in her old age, and his father was a depressed drunk. But Emil was not expecting to have his own problems shoved in his face.

"You know I'm trying, Kao."

"What did you have for breakfast this morning?"

"..."

"Damn it, Emil." he whispered, and pulled him closer. His brown eyes closed and his thick eyebrows furrowed with concern.

"Don't tell on me, Kao."

They stayed frozen int heir embrace for the longest time, Kao kissing away stray tears and Emil telling him he was sorry over and over again. They could fix this, they had to.

_"You're the only one I love."_

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><p><strong>soundtrack:<strong>

Who Said Anything - The Hoosiers  
>Brick Soundtrack #1<p>

Review please!


	2. Chapter 2

It had been a few months since Lukas and Mikkel had called Emil out on his eating disorder. They had gotten him help and he had gained a considerable amount of weight through a new diet and a counselor. His parents had decided he had handled it rather well, and that he seemed happier as of late. Even though he was still unhealthy, they began to notice how much more preoccupied he was becoming.

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><p>Kaoru was sitting in the kitchen, books spilling over the dining room table and papers stacked up. Emil was sitting close to him, poring over some research he needed for an exam he had the next day. Kao's mother was in the kitchen and his father was in the living room, passed out in his chair and snoring quite loudly. Emil sighed and scooted their chairs just a bit closer and pressed himself up against the other's side. Kao looked down at him, but Emil wouldn't look up.<p>

"What's wrong, Em?"

"Nothing. Just cold." he muttered sleepily. Kaoru smiled faintly and went back to his note taking. His mother came to the table and gave them both some tea. She smiled at Emil and that was the first time he actually got a look at her - She had a few wrinkles underneath her eyes, but the smile was bright and her hair was healthy; put into a neat bun at the nape of her neck.

"Thank you Mrs. Kirkland." Emil said, trying to his best to look grateful and to show that he wasn't some worthless moocher. She smiled at him and cooed, "It's no problem, sweetie." Then she turned to Kaoru and her appearance seemed to change in an instant, her eyes darkened, "Kaoru! Why can't you be polite like your friend?"

"Thank you, mother." he spoke stiffly. She seemed to take this well and said she was going to go out into the living room to spend time with Arthur. Kaoru nodded, but didn't respond.

Emil sipped at the bitter tea and watched Kaoru take his notes, fingers and wrist flying across the paper a million miles an hour. Emil was okay with the fact he was probably going to fail the exam he was studying for. He was okay with the fact that he and Kaoru hadn't snuck around to see each other in over two months. At first he thought it was because of Lukas and Mikkel prying so much, but he had realized that it was because Kaoru was just worked around the clock, busy with professors and his parents. Or it was because he was bored with Emil. No matter how hard he tried he couldn't shake the feeling that Kao might just be bored with him.

Then Kao stops and says something completely out of the blue, "I'm glad you're better, Emil."

"Thanks. I guess I am, too." he replies, but Emil abandons Kaoru's side and begins to gather up his homework. He smiles but it wavers. "I'm going to go now."

"You haven't finished studying."

"I can finish at home."

Then there was silence and Kao ended up following Emil to the door and they ended up facing one another for the longest time before Emil initiated a soft kiss. It was light and Emil's lips, once chapped and almost always scabbed were soft and pleasant. Kaoru's tongue brushed lightly against his lower lip, making him shudder. But then he was gone, and the door was closed, and Kaoru was staring at empty space; with his heart fluttering in the most unusual way.

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><p>"So... who was that?"<p>

"No one, mother."

"You kissed him."

"I did not."

"Well fine then, he kissed you, and you kissed back."

"Mother, I do not wish to speak of this."

"... Do you and your father need to have a talk?"

"I want nothing to do with him, mother."

"He loves you, you know."

"... Who are we even talking about anymore?"

"Now we're talking about both of them, dear."

"I know what it looks like, but he's not the reason my grades slipped up a little. I swear."

"But you two have such a strong connection - anyone can see it. Perhaps he is a distraction from your studies."

"I just said he wasn't."

"Dear-"

"Mom. I'm going to bed early."

"Well... all right, Kaoru." she placed a soft kiss on his forehead and stepped out of his room. Kao promptly flopped down on his bed without pulling back the covers and closed his eyes. The gears were still turning, in his head and in his chest. _What is wrong with you?__ Kissing him back like that. You're a spineless coward. Stop confusing everyone! You're confusing him, yourself, your mother, your father. Everyone!_

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><p>Kaoru moved through the next few weeks surrounded by a muggy atmosphere and the somewhat permanent feel of Emil's lips on his own. But Emil hadn't spoke to him, or given him any more than a stray glance or a forced smile before he turned away. It was torture, pure and simple. He knew somewhere in the back of his mind that Emil still had problems and his weight-gaining had put a huge amount of stress on his shoulders, but now it was as if they couldn't even speak to each other.<p>

Then, when Kao was forcefully dragged to some Friday-night party by his twin cousins, he might have just stayed in the corner and watched Emil as he flirted with some brown-haired, green-eyed boy. He might have been boiling with unprecedented rage at the fact that he had pushed Emil away and Emil hadn't tried to stay. He had tried so hard to keep everything collected and now this was happening.

Emil kept glancing at him, though. And Kaoru kept accidentally locking eyes and it was just so _horribly awkward _the way they looked at each other. Emil sipped at his drink and clutched the red plastic cup with his pale fingers, saying something to the boy before smiling. The boy turned and left, leaving Emil by himself. Then the Icelandic boy turned and faced Kaoru fully, to mouth 'hello' and allow the other to actually see him.

Kaoru's head was still buzzing from the lights and the sounds when this happened. He worried his lip for a moment before abandoning his post by the wall and approaching the other. The tension increased with each step he took.

"Hey, Kao. How have you been holding up?" Emil asked, blue eyes sparkling but pink lips remaining suppressed into a fine line.

_Fine, I'm fine. Losing sleep and getting jealous and having a migraine every other day because I can't switch off. Perfectly fine. _His mind said.

"Not too well," his lips said. Kaoru practically had to shout over the music that had increased in volume, "And you?"

"I've been doing fine. A little preoccupied with trivial matters like sleeping and studying. Even though those two don't really go hand-in-hand." A smile. "Why are you 'not too well', Kaoru?" Concern.

"Well, for starters, I've missed you." Not bad. "And mother-dear wouldn't let me hear the end of it after you left that last day. Father's been drinking more and hardly leaves the house. My grades are slipping and I'm being dragged to parties by my insufferable twin cousins." Kaoru goes off, and Emil frowns a little.

"I'm really sorry about all the trouble I've caused. It's just... my parents knew-"

Something snapped inside Kaoru's mind and his hands began to twitch in his pockets.

"-so I really didn't have any other choice. I was so embarrassed. They knew about everything and they wanted me to fix it by stopping. By stopping everything even though you were the only thing that made me feel better."

_You're the only thing I love._

"But," he continues, "Well, I think we can talk about this somewhere else." Emil casts a glance over his shoulder at the boy he was seemingly flirting with. Kaoru visibly bristles, but doesn't say anything.

Emil leads him out and around the the back of the house. Kaoru doesn't remember whose house it is - he thinks it might be one of his cousin's closer friends, but he can't be sure. Kaoru sees himself reflected in the other's eyes and bites his lip again, because Emil is beautiful and he would do anything to just take him up in his arms and just hold him.

"Listen, Kao, I didn't mean to make you all... off, or whatever it is you are right now. I just needed a break. And I'm not the same person that your best friend used to be. So I just sort of convinced myself that you didn't need me anymore because you deserved someone smarter and more confident than I am. Someone who can give as well as take, and not hurt so bad because they're weak. I just wanted you to be happy."

"But you _are_ smarter, and more confident now. I don't really deserve anyone because I'm always so busy and when I do have time I don't always spend it the way I should. But maybe we could have another chance if we went slower? If... if you still want to."

"I'd like that very much."

Emil closed the space between them, hugged him tight, and rested his chin on the other's shoulder. Kaoru wrapped his arms around the other and smiled into his hair.

"I love you."

"I love you, too."


End file.
